1. Field of the Invention
This invention relates to the engagement of the peripheral attention of a person in the vicinity of a display device such as the display monitor of a computer.
2. Related Art
Information providers of all sorts have an interest in presenting their information to information consumers and, in particular, to information consumers who may, or do, have an interest in the particular information provided by the particular information provider. At the same time, information consumers have an interest in accessing a wide variety of information and, in particular, information in which the information consumer may, or does, have an interest. Given the extent to which computers now permeate society, and particularly in view of the escalation of networking of those computers in various ways, there is increasing recognition of the capability of using computers, and, in particular, computers (and other devices) that are interconnected in a network, as an information dissemination tool that can satisfy the interests of both information providers and information consumers.
For example, information providers have used public computer networks (e.g., the Internet) and private computer networks (e.g., commercial online services such as America Online, Prodigy and CompuServe) to disseminate their information. This information can be displayed to a computer user having access to the network directly in response to a request from the user or indirectly (i.e., without request by the user) as a result of another action taken by the user. While these methods of information dissemination and acquisition can be effective, they do not exhaust the possibilities.
In a different vein, historically, computers have frequently included screen saving mechanisms ("screen savers") intended to prevent the phosphors of a computer display screen from burning out when the same image remains on the screen for a long period of time, such as might occur during a long period of inactivity while the computer is operating. As computer display screen technology has progressed, the use of screen savers to preserve the display screen has become increasingly unnecessary. However, the use of screen savers has continued--even proliferated--likely due to the aesthetic or entertainment value provided by the imagery of many screen savers. Further, the use of "wallpaper" (i.e., a pattern generated in the background portions on a computer display screen) in computer display screens has also arisen, largely one would suspect because of the aesthetic or entertainment value of the wallpaper imagery. While the use of screen savers and wallpaper with computer displays appeals to many users because of the imagery they present to the user, screen savers and wallpaper have not heretofore been used as a means to convey information from information providers to computer users. Further, screen savers and wallpaper have previously been implemented as relatively simple, self-contained computer application programs that are not typically integrated with other application programs or other aspects of computer operation. In particular, screen saver and wallpaper application programs have not been constructed to enable retrieval of display content from a remote location via a computer network.